Utagawa Kunikazu (active 1849 - 1867) Actors Nakamura Tamashichi as Mashiba Hideyoshi and Nakamura Kanjaku as Ishikawa Goemon in Konoshitakage Hazama Kassen, 1857. Deluxe Chuban diptych.
A veritable jewel box of a print. Like an encrusted ornament, this deluxe diptych is layered with every glossy trick that the refined Osaka printmakers could imagine…This is a superb, pre-commercial edition with extensive gauffrage, burnished patterns on the black of the kimono, hand applied gum arabic for the smoke and several exotic and metallic pigments. It’s a real show-off of a print.
The subject is that of the great and famous, Ishikawa Goemon, the so-called King of Thieves. He was boiled in oil with his small son for the attempted assassination of Mashiba Hideyoshi, who later became Toyotomi Hideyoshi the shogun who was to succeed Oda Nobunaga.
Colour and impression here are very fine and perfectly preserved. The print suffers some irregular trimming to the top edge, there are a couple of vertical folds, some minor marks and flaws but generally very good preservation.
38 x 24.5 cm.
